BIOMECHANICS OF BASEBALL PITCHING

The rate at which a baseball pitch occurs is extremely fast. In order to understand the many motions and movements that occur simultaneously, it can be helpful to watch a pitch in slow motion. Click on the link below for a video

WHAT AND WHY?

Biomechanics in sports, can be stated as muscular, joint, and skeletal actions of the body during the execution of a given task, skill, and/or technique. Proper understanding of biomechanics relating to sports skill has the greatest implication on: sports performance, rehabilitation and injury prevention, along with sports mastery. In relation to sport, biomechanics contributes to the description, explanation and prediction of the mechanical aspects of human exercise, sport, and play.

THE KINETIC CHAIN

The concept of the kinetic chain refers to the energy being created with the larger segments and muscles and then the transfer of that energy up through the trunk, out to the throwing arm, wrist, and ultimately the ball. The motion of each of the segments in the chain helps not only to maintain energy transferred, but also to build on it. The more body segments that sequentially contribute to the total force output, the greater the potential velocity at the distal end where the object is released. Proper execution of the kinetic chain in an overhead motion increases the efficiency of the movement by displacing less energy.

Baseball pitching can be be described as a sequential activation of body parts through a link segment beginning with the contralateral foot and progressing through the trunk to the rapidly accelerating upper extremity. Improper mechanics or injury that alter this complex chain of events will in turn produce additional stressed in other links of the chain. The upper extremity can be characterized as an open kinetic chain, experiencing rapid acceleration and deceleration

HOW FAST IS FAST?

Velocity can be defined as change in position, with respect to time. The rate at which an entire pitch occurs is extremely fast. The time from leading foot contact to ball release is approximately 0.14 seconds, while the entire motion is approximately 3 seconds in length. The majority of the time is spent during the wind-up phase and follow through.

From the time of maximum external rotation, the shoulder will internally rotate about 60 degress in less than 10 milliseconds during arm acceleration. The maximum internal rotation velocity is typically 7000 degrees/second, making it one of the fastest human motions in sports. A typical elbow extension velocity is approximately 2400 degrees/second.